Twelve schools and two public charter management organizations from Aurora, Brighton, Denver, Littleton and Jefferson County are recipients of a $435,000 awards program grant from the Foundations for Great Schools.

The Foundation for Great Schools – a grant program comprised of partnerships between The Anschutz Foundation, Daniels Fund, Fox Family Foundation, Gates Family Foundation and Piton Foundation – selects annual award winners from among a 12-school district area.

Winners are chosen based on a variety of factors, including academic performance and growth, percentage of students qualifying for the Federal free and reduced lunch program, school leadership, culture, and instructional effectiveness.

“The schools we are recognizing today have shown they can motivate and teach students to make significant academic progress,” said Tom Kaesemeyer, executive director of the Fox Family Foundation and spokesman for Foundations of Great Schools. “They have taken whatever challenges they might face and turned them into opportunities for student success. Each of these schools is achieving very strong results in academic growth and performance, and the strategies they are taking to achieve that success deserve to recognized.”

The $435,000 grant will be distributed among these 2013 Foundations for Great Schools winners:

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